Who Said This?

It’s time to test your knowledge of musicians and musical quotes. How many of these quotations do you recognize? And do you know who said them?

Do your best; it’s not an easy quiz! And when you’re ready, you can get the answers by clicking the link at the bottom of this post.

Good luck!

The Harp is to Music what Music is to Life.

…this is my only aim: to serve art and my harp, my ambition does not go beyond that.

…How sour sweet music is When time is broke and no proportion kept! So it is in the music of men’s lives…

I don’t choose what I compose. It chooses me.

Never look encouragingly at the brass, except with a short glance to give an important cue.

I have wept only three times in my life: the first time when my earliest opera failed, the second time when, with a boating party, a truffled turkey fell into the water, and the third time when I first heard Paganini play.

Never play carelessly, even when there is nobody listening, or the occasion seems unimportant.

There is nothing remarkable about it. All you have to do is hit the right keys at the right time, and the instrument plays itself.

A definition of music: The exaltation of the mind derived from things eternal bursting forth in sound.

If a literary man puts together two words about music, one of them will be wrong.

The artist must forget the audience, forget the critics, forget the technique, forget everything but love for the music. Then, the music speaks through the performance, and the performer and the listener will walk together with the soul of the composer, and with God.

Music . . . can name the unnameable and communicate the unknowable.

The secrets of the harp are far simpler than certain people imagine, and its possibilities are never-ending for those who have faith.

Music creates order out of chaos: for rhythm imposes unanimity upon the divergent, melody imposes continuity upon the disjointed, and harmony imposes compatibility upon the incongruous.

Harp not on that string.

If you are not making mistakes, you are not working hard enough.

Practice means to perform over and over again in the face of all obstacles, some act of vision, of faith, of desire. Practice is a means of inviting the perfection desired.

Tara

thank you Anne, that was very informative and helpful. I need to practice the basics and you pointed out exactly what I needed to hear. As soon as my family wakes up I will practice your suggested techniques.
Tara